The Great British Menu winner has teamed up with restaurant consultant Mike Palmer to invest £1m in the city’s Red Roaster Coffee site, creating 30 jobs.
The venue will serve a ‘unique take’ on cafe food from 7am-4pm, before turning in to restaurant Pike & Pine in the evening.
Coffee will be roasted daily in the team’s own vintage Diedrich roaster and served alongside ‘great value’ dishes cooked in Gillan’s unique style.
“Mike calls it ‘Michelin Star for a tenner’, but I prefer that we were known for food that you would be comfortable eating more than once a week, and which you would want to bring your friends back to share,” said Gillan.
“At the outset we set ourselves the goal of creating the best café in the world, and that principle has guided us ever since.”
Evening menu
The evening restaurant will offer a small plate a la carte menu alongside six and eight-course tasting menus.
Up to ten guests will be able to dine close to the buzz of the kitchen at an eight-metre marble counter where Gillan will showcase around ten signature dishes.
The chef said he hoped the restaurant would ‘bolster Brighton’s reputation as one of the most exciting up and coming food destinations’.
Gillan left his role at The Pass restaurant at South Lodge in Horsham in April after a decade-long tenure which saw him retain a Michelin Star for five years.
He has since run a series of pop-ups at Lucky Beach on Brighton seafront.